confused..what's this about sugar and bone char?

Question

can somebody please explain to me about the relationship between them? do all sugars have something to do with it? =/

so in candy bars, does that involve the sugar filtered in bone char?

Answer 1

Some cane sugar is refined and whitened through a filter made of bone char--the charred bones of animals. Some vegans won't touch this because even though no animal products wind up in the package, it's still a product of exploitation.

To avoid this, you can try to find one or more of the following:

Sucanat (SUgar CAne NATural)
Turbinado (raw) sugar. If you've ever seen Sugar in the Raw at a local restaurant, that's turbinado. It has a really pretty golden color.
Evaporated cane juice crystals. I have seen this at Whole Foods
Beet sugar (never processed through bone char).

I think there's a website where you can find out which brands don't use bone char, but I'm not sure.

You can also use agave nectar, a liquid, as a sweetner, but you'll have to adjust the recipe if you use it in baking or cooking. It's quite sweet and has a texture slightly thinner than honey.

Answer 2

About half of refined cane sugar goes through a carbon-filtering process involving bone char. Refined beet sugar, however, does not involve bone char in the processing. If you want to know whether a company uses sugar that has gone through the bone char processing stage, simply email the company and ask. There is a 25% chance that you are consuming sugar that has gone through the bone char filtering process, so never hesitate to email the company.

Companies that sell bone-char-free sugar:

American Crystal Sugar Company (brand: Crystal Sugar) uses beet sugar

Florida Crystals Refinery uses naturally milled sugar cane

Imperial Sugar Company (brands: Spreckles , Holly Sugar, Pioneer Sugar) uses beet sugar

Irish Sugar Ltd. (brand: Siucra) uses beet sugar

Monitor Sugar Company (brand: Big Chief) uses beet sugar

Refined Sugars Incorporated (brands: Jack Frost, Country Cane, 4# Flow-Sweet) uses granular carbon filter instead of bone char

Sucanat is an organic sugar that is not very refined but some is made with honey

Supreme Sugar Company (brands: Supreme, Southern Bell, Rouse's Markets)

Sugar in the Raw is less processed and doesn't need very much filtering

Companies that DO use bone char:

Domino, Savannah Foods, California and Hawaii Sugar Company (C&H) with exception of Washed Raw Sugar

Answer 3

I don't know if they consider it strictly "vegetarian" (I imagine that most acknowledge that bone char is not), but from an AR perspective, it is such a minor matter that it is hardly worth thinking about. I believe it is better for vegetarians, and especially vegans, who are already working hard to keep animal products out of their diet, not to worry about something that might have happened during processing involving a small amount of slaughterhouse by-product. (This goes for the filtering of wine and beer, as well.) This is both so we can keep our sanity and so we won't seem terribly finicky to others. Imagine if your Grandma, proud that she had gone out to find Earth Balance, Ener-G egg replacer, and soy milk to make you a cake, had to be told that there was something wrong with the sugar and now you won't eat the cake. Now, I know it's a slippery slope, and you'd have to correct Grandma if she thought eggs were vegan, but the poor lady bought a bag of pure vegetable product: white sugar. Don't make her go back to the factory to examine the processing methods and the worker's shoes. If we start making people do that, they'll stop wanting to cook for us at all. Now, I tend to buy organic sugar which also happens to be vegan, in small part because, yes, I do want my everyday sugar to be purely vegan, but I would NEVER refuse to take a spoon of someone else's sugar because of the processing. We have to remember that we're doing this for the animals, not out of some impossible quest for 100% body purity.

Answer 4

SUGAR IS A NATURALL WHITE CRYSTAL. The "refinement" of cane sugar amounts to nothing more than heating the juice to evaporate the water and then cleaning it. To "whiten" cane sugar, manufactures simply wash and filter it. The evaporated cane juice is mechanically filtered to remove debris, dirt, insect parts, etc. It is washed with a super-saturated sugar syrup to remove "contaminates" such as sugar that was caramelized during the evaporation phase. Filtering thru bone char, or more correctly bone charcoal, is just another cleaning step. Raw sugar, turbinado, etc. are sugars that have some of the caramelized sugar remaining in it. They are not "less refined", they are "less cleaned" than regular table sugar. The advertising hints that raw sugar is more healthful is solely marketing hype.

It is certainly acceptable to choose not to consume sugar that has been filtered thru bone charcoal. But do so for political or ethical reasons, not because it is healthier, because it is not more healthful.

Likely one of the other answerers has pointed out that the bone charcoal is from "found" bones, and not from animals slaughtered for food. During the process of converting the bones to charcoal, all organic matter, including bacteria, yeasts and viruses, is carbonized.

As others have pointed out, beet sugar is not filtered thru bone charcoal. The process for extraction obviates this need.

I laud your efforts to inform yourself about what you eat!

Answer 5

Some cane sugars are filtered with bone char; no beet sugar is and neither is cane juice.

But you're not supporting the livestock industry by using bone char filtered sugar. It is made from found bones and is not allowed to be made in the US.

Answer 6

Generally this is something to do with refined sugar. That sugar may have been processed with animal bone char.

I usually use turbinado sugar (raw sugar crystals), which can be found in such brands as Sugar in the Raw.

Answer 7

Most refined sugars and artificial sweeteners taste more like a chem lab floor than sweet anyway.

I dont know why people want everything so sweet, most good home made food has many different tastes that are much better than generic 'sweet'.